As we have seen, Spain was an exhausted power by 1820. Mexico had been in revolt for nearly 10 years. In South America, Simon Bolivar was marching to victory after victory against the royalist forces. The monarchy in Spain had lost all its ancient legitimacy and vitality in 1808 when Napoleon Bonaparte conquered the country and installed his drunken brother Joseph to the throne. But even the restoration of the Spanish monarchy failed to stem the tide. The empire, it seemed, was dying.
Texas was one of the most remote and hopeless parts of that empire. Outside of San Antonio, the government had almost no control, and the few existing towns basically ran themselves. Indian raids were rampant, and particularly in the case of the Comanches, brutal. The "King's Highway" which supposedly linked Texas to Louisiana, was little more than an imaginative line on the map.
The old missions which had served the Indians and formed the backbone of Spanish Texas, were in ruins. More than half of the walls of San Antonio de Valero - known to the locals as the Alamo - were collapsed. Livestock and rattlesnakes roamed free inside the roofless chapel which would one day be a worldwide icon of liberty.
Just at the perfect moment, an itinerant American/Spaniard named Moses Austin arrived on the scene. He had left the U.S. years before to move to Louisiana territory, which at the time was Spanish. Adopting Spanish citizenship and the Spanish language, Austin became a savvy trader linking America and New Spain.
Proud of his Spanish citizenship, Moses Austin had no intention of ever returning to America. He became fluent in Spanish and converted to Catholicism. But his dream of a new life in a new country came to an abrupt end in 1803.
Spain had won Louisiana from France after the Seven Years' War (French and Indian War, as it was known in America). But after Spain's conquest by Napoleon and the establishment of Joseph Bonaparte on the throne, Spain's new king gave the potentially wealthy land in America back to France. Napoleon, fighting wars in Europe that required money and focus, turned around and sold Louisiana to the U.S. There was no way he could keep it, and a failed expedition to Haiti convinced him that the new world was a malaria-infested Hellhole. And most importantly, Napoleon knew if he didn't cash out on his somewhat illegitimate claim on the territory, a revived Spanish monarchy might take it back from him.
Moses Austin, now once again a citizen of the United States, soon became a leader in the growing city of St. Louis, Missouri. As an American by birth, he was the perfect bridge between the French/Spanish citizens of Missouri and the flood of new American immigrants who poured in. But he was hit hard by the panic of 1819 and lost virtually everything. To top it off, a feud with his brother Stephen (for whom his son was named) wiped out any claim he had to the family land in Virginia. At 58, Moses Austin had gone from middle class to riches to rags.
But Austin was a visionary, and saw opportunity in Texas. Calling on old connections among the Spanish, he headed to San Antonio to sell the Spaniards on his new scheme to import American immigrants - who would become patriotic Spanish citizens just as he had - to save the dying colony of Texas from ruin.
At first the Spanish governor was inclined to throw him out of town for traveling to Spain without his petition - despite Austin's proof of former Spanish citizenship. But a chance encounter with an old friend bought him time, and soon the governor came around to Austin - and to his idea.
Just at the moment of his triumph when the Spanish governor in Mexico City had accepted his terms, Austin's endeavors got the worst of him, and after a short stint of sickness, he died with his dream seemingly unfulfilled. But there was still hope: His final words in a letter to his son, Stephen F. Austin, called on his son to follow in his footsteps.A dutiful son, Stephen F. Austin was driven more by loyalty to his father than by his own ambition. He himself had settled in Arkansas and just barely lost a surprisingly strong race for U.S. Congress. Nonetheless, the ambitious son shelved his own dreams to fulfill the dying wish of a father. In 1821, he arrived in Texas to take up the cause. By the time he had arrived, however, Spain had ended its decade-long battle against the inevitable and accepted Mexican Independence. And with Mexico went Texas.
Stephen F. Austin had a whole new audience to convince.
Mexico inherits Spanish weakness
The facts, however, were unchanged. Texas was slipping, and the decade of war had only made things worse. Mexico, newly independent and friendly to the U.S., accepted Austin's terms, and within the year, Austin was back in the U.S., signing up 300 colonists to settle in the territory.
Austin and his settlers arrived three years later and founded a colony. It was soon joined by others, as new "empresarios" sought to piggyback on Austin's suddenly lucrative business. The population in Texas soon began to grow dramatically. The Anglo settlers, with better agricultural techniques, strong social bonds and modern rifles, were able to tame the lands that the Spaniards never could. More colonies were approved, and many new settlers arrived (including my own great, great, great grandparents, who crossed into Texas in the mid 1820s.)
But even as Texas became a growing success, the winds in Mexico were changing. Ever since the revolution, there had been a power struggle between Federalists - those who wanted less government, devolved to the states - and Centralists who wanted a single government run by a strong ruler. There were many players, but for our narrative we will focus on two who would be central to the struggle in Texas.
Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna.
Santa Anna was from humble beginnings, but rose quickly in the Spanish Army. In fact, he had been a Lieutenant in the army of Arredondo at the Battle of Medina (see Part I). In that engagement he had proven his bravery and skill, but also learned Arredondo's brutal tactics - tactics he himself would one day embrace in his own time as a general.
Santa Anna had originally fought for Spain against the revolutionaries, but showing the beginnings of a trait which would eventually become a cruel joke on the Mexican people - he switched sides now and became an ardent Federalist and champion of Democracy. He soon rose fast, and eventually became president of Mexico. Here, however, he would once again shift sides - this time to become a Centralist, embracing the idea of single, strong centralized power.
Lorenzo de Zavala
Lorenzo Justiniano de Zavala, a native of the Yucutan peninsula, had proud Spanish patrician upbringing, unlike Santa Anna. In an irony not unique in history, Santa Anna, the child of poverty, rose to embrace power and wealth while Zavala, the child of privilege, embraced democracy and the common man.
Parliament, but when revolution broke out in Mexico, he crossed the ocean to return to Mexico and embrace the cause. Zavala, an admirer of the American Founding Fathers, plunged himself into Mexican politics as a die-hard Federalist. Unlike Santa Anna, he would never change.
Zavala was crucial in the early days of the new republic and served on the committee that wrote the Mexican constitution, which bore striking resemblance to the American one. The one-time Spanish legislator now served in the Mexican congress from his new home in Texas. Unlike the majority of Mexican Texans, he didn't settle in the old Spanish towns, but took up residence in the new, predominately Anglo settlements of East Texas. There he would develop new friends and his passion for American-style democracy would only grow stronger.
For a time, it seemed that things would work out well. Texas was indeed being civilized, and despite the fact that the colonists were causing a dramatic demographic shift, they showed no signs of wanting to break away. In fact, some of the new colonists - such as those who had come from Ireland to form San Patricio County (named after St. Patrick) - would be immensely loyal to Mexico, and when the revolution came, they would fight on the side of the Mexicans against their fellow colonists, even as Tejanos would cross the line to fight against their ethnic kinsmen.
By 1832, the wheels of fate that would draw them to that confrontation would begin to turn. Santa Anna had ascended to the presidency, ending the previous government which had stalled any reforms in Texas. At first, the settlers embraced him. He talked like a good Federalist. But soon, Santa Anna would start clamping down, and not just on Texas. No fewer than four Mexican states would soon rise in rebellion, including de Zavala's own home state of Yucatan.
Paranoia, Rabble-Rousers and the coming of the Revolution.
Stephen F. Austin, a lifelong bachelor who had by now devoted himself entirely to Texas, fought tirelessly to avoid an open break. But suspicions in Mexico were growing and hotheads in Texas were stirring the pot. Most Texans, like Austin, only wanted to live quiet lives in peace. But a few, like newly-arrived hotspur William Barret Travis, talked of independence. And not all of the old Hispanic citizens of the growing colony were opposed. Travis' best friend in his new homeland was none other than Zavala, who still hoped for more freedoms from Mexico, but who was beginning to doubt that they would ever come.
As part of Santa Anna's consolidation of power, a series of restrictions had been placed on all of the Mexican states, but none fared worse than Texas. Combining the government with that of Cohuilla to the South, Mexico hoped to save expenses. It made government, justice and nearly every aspect of commerce impossible in Texas. Citizens had to wait for years just to get married, and then only if they happened to corner one of the few roaming priests who made their way to the distant land. Finally, shocked by the inspector's report from Texas, xenophobic legislators in Mexico tore up the Texans' petitions and passed a law banning all new immigration to Texas from outside of Mexico.
Hoping to avoid a break and ease tensions, Austin - the one man most committed to keeping Texas as part of Mexico (more so even than Zavala and many Tejanos) - traveled to Mexico City to try to find a compromise. But rather than find an open government willing to hear the Texans' petitions, he found himself thrown unceremoniously into a dungeon.
The news hit Texas like a thunderbolt, and even the moderates and Tejanos were angered. Even so, cool heads prevailed and no action took place, hoping that the crisis would pass and Austin would be freed.
Finally, in 1834, after months in a Mexican dungeon, Austin returned to Texas a changed man. While rapprochement with the Mexican people was possible, it had become clear that Santa Anna was a dictator who would never recognize the rights of his people. With Austin now on the side of resistance, the mood in Texas swung decisively against Santa Anna. The constitution - which Zavala himself had helped write - must be restored. Or Texas would fight.
As talk of revolution began to spread throughout Mexico, Texans began to gird for battle.
Gonzales: Come and Take It
Matters finally came to a head in the small town of Gonzales. The increasingly paranoid Mexican garrison in San Antonio de Bexar sent a small detachment of cavalry to recover a small cannon which had been given to the settlers to defend against the enemy. As artillery, it was pathetic - no longer than an average man's forearm. It had only been given to the settlers to fight the Indians because they tended to run away from loud booms.
But as a symbol, it was powerful. The Gonzales cannon represented the social contract itself. Of government working for the people, not government oppressing the people. Refusing to accept being forcibly disarmed, a group of 32 Texans gathered beneath a flag featuring a picture of the cannon, a star, and the words, "Come and Take it." The words evoked the well-known legend of Thermopylae, where the Spartan King Leonidas had given the same response to a demand by the Persian king to hand over his sword (see "300").
The battle that ensued was short and small, but incredibly important. Only one Mexican soldier was killed in the exchange of gunfire before the Mexicans retreated back to San Antonio. But the die had been cast: there would be blood.
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